#### 16.5.5 Combining index levels for HTML-based Help

Suppose you have a two-level index entry, with only one instance of a second level for the first-level text. In printed books, the usual practice is to combine the first- and second-level text into one first-level entry. By default, DITA2Go follows this practice for HTML-based Help indexes. If you expect to merge indexes from two or more Help projects, you might not want the levels combined.

To keep DITA2Go from combining levels for such index entries:

    [Index]
    ; CombineIndexLevels = Yes (default) or No (always break at colon)
    CombineIndexLevels=No

When CombineIndexLevels=Yes, if there is only one item at the last level of a series of multi-level index entries, DITA2Go removes the colon before the last item and replaces it with one of the following, depending on what character immediately precedes (or follows) the level-break colon:

- nothing, if a space precedes or follows the colon
- a space, if punctuation (such as an escaped colon or a comma) precedes the colon
- a comma followed by a space, if an alphanumeric character precedes the colon.

For example, suppose an index marker contains:

    tomatoes:Cherokee Purple

and there are no other first-level index entries for “tomatoes”. This entry would become:

    tomatoes, Cherokee Purple

in the Help index.

When CombineIndexLevels=No, DITA2Go breaks index entries at all unescaped colons.

Previous Topic: 16.5.4 Treating commas as potential index level separators

Next Topic: 16.5.6 Configuring See and See also entries for HTML-based Help

Parent Topic: 16.5 Configuring index entries for Help systems

Sibling Topics:

16.5.1 Understanding how DITA2Go creates Help index entries

16.5.2 Preparing index entries for Microsoft Help Viewer

16.5.3 Limiting length of index entries for HTML Help or WinHelp

16.5.4 Treating commas as potential index level separators

16.5.6 Configuring See and See also entries for HTML-based Help

16.5.7 Specifying index link destinations for HTML-based Help

16.5.8 Customizing index sort order